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tv   Newsline 30min  KCSMMHZ  December 7, 2012 6:00am-6:30am PST

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welcome to nhk world "newsline." an official in seoul says north korea may soon begin loading fuel ahead of an expected launch of what the country calls a satellite-carrying rocket. north korea has announced that the launch will take place sometime between december 10th and 22nd. the south korean official cited increased activity around the tongchang-ri launch site in northwestern north korea. earlier reports said all three stages of the rocket had been assembled. south korea's yonhap news agency quotes a government official as saying the fueling of the rocket could begin on saturday after
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the storage tank has been filled. chinese travel agencies have been informed that foreign tourists won't be allowed into north korea between the 15th and 20th of this month. analysts say the decision could be linked to events marking the first anniversary of kim jong-il's death on december 17th. in japan, government leaders have ordered self-defense forces to be prepared to shoot down any debris from the rocket. the defense minister passed on that order to sdf commanders. >> translator: the day of the rocket launch, we ordered the sdf to intercept any debris from a north korean rocket. we're preparing in accordance with that order. >> it will fly southwest of okinawa's island. they're deploying surface to air missiles throughout the region. prime minister yoshihiko noda
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held a national security meeting with his ministers. he approved the order for the sdf to mobilize their missile defense systems and shoot down any debris. this will be the third such order issued by the government. the last time was in april, when north korean officials launched another rocket. it blew up less than two minutes after liftoff. authorities in japan have given the all-clear to people living along the north eastern coast. they lifted a tsunami warning and advisory issued after a strong earthquake shook the region. analysts say the tremor was likely an aftershock from the march 2011 earthquake. the estimated 7.3 magnitude tremor jolted the country at 5:18 local time triggering tsunami. this is the same part of japan that was hit by last year's quake. immediately after friday's tremor, authorities issued a tsunami warning and advisories for pacific coastal regions.
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they say a tsunami of one meter came racing ashore in the northeastern prefecture of miyagi hitting the coastal city of ishinomaki. so far there are no reports of major injuries or damage. authorities lifted warnings and advisories two hours after the quake hit. this tremor struck in the early evening as people were heading home from work or getting ready to sit down to dinner. agency spokesperson believe it was an aftershock of the march 11th earthquake. we felt the tremor here in tokyo. buildings swayed for a number of minutes. local authorities in north eastern japan said the earthquake caused limited damage. nhk has learned that ten people were injured in four prefectures, including miyagi and ibaraki. more than 5,000 residents in coastal areas of miyagi prefecture evacuated to higher ground out of concern over tsunami. 15 flights at sendai airport in
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the northeast were canceled because the airport is in the tsunami zone. two nuclear power plants damaged in last year's quake, including the fukushima daiichi plant, did not suffer any damage. the powerful earthquake prompted local authorities to call for the evacuation of coastal areas in fukushima, miyagi, and iwate prefectures, but some residents say information about the quake and tsunami alert failed to reach them. >> translator: the shaking lasted for a long time. but i didn't hear any information from the municipality. i decided to evacuate on my own. >> translator: i'm all right now. >> translator: i ran away as soon as i felt the big tremor.
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we promised to gather here in case of an emergency. >> translator: it was really scary. i was worried about my grandchildren. >> president benigno aquino has visited areas of the philippines devastated by this week's typhoon. patchari raksang has more details from bangkok. president aquino's visit comes as the death toll from the typhoon has risen to at least 450. hundreds more are missing. rescue operations continue in the devastated areas, but progress is slow and many of the displaced are degs pratt. aquino visited typhoon-ravaged compastela valley on the southern island of mindanao on friday. >> translator: i want to know why this tragedy happened. i want to see how we can prevent
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a similar tragedy from happening again. but of course we need to tend to the needs of the survivors. that is why we're here today, to make sure that your government is truly servinging you. >> typhoon bopha struck the region on tuesday. reuters reports more than 10,000 homes have been totally destroyed across dozens of provinces. officials say at least 530 people are still missing. fallen trees and debris are blocking roads and bridges, and emergency supplies have been slow to reach many devastated towns. afghanistan's intelligence chief has been seriously wounded in a bomb attack in kabul. the taliban has claimed responsibility for thursday's attack on the close aide to president hamid karzai. the incident underscores questions about the afghan government's ability to maintain security. hideki yui has the story from kabul. >> reporter: the national directorate was at a guest house
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to welcome when he became the target of a suicide attack. halib is a cross aide to president karzai. he began his job in september. karzai announced the attack. he said halib is being treated in hospital. >> reporter: the agency spokesperson says the attack closely resembles the one used to assassinate rabbani in september 2011. rabbani was a man charged with negotiating peace with the taliban.
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his death was a major setback for the karzai government. the taliban has issued a statement claiming responsibility for the attack on halib. experts have warned that militant groups would attempt more attacks against government chiefs as it's ka lates its offensive against international and government forces. with international combat troops scheduled to withdraw from afghanistan in two years' time. concerns are growing that the afghan government is not ready to take over security. hideki yui, nhk world, kabul. and that wraps up our bulletin for today. i'm patchari raksawong in bangkok. u.s. labor department officials have released the latest jobs report. they say the employment situation improved in november.
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this is the first employment data after president barack obama was re-elected. the unemployment rate last month fell to 7.7% from 7.9% in october. the jobless rate has now been below 8% for three straight months. u.s. employers added 146,000 jobs in the nonfarm sector such as retail trade, professional, and business services and health care. that's more than economists had forecast. u.s. employers added 138,000 jobs in october. the officials of the labor department say hurricane sandy, which shook the country's east coast in late october, did not substantively impact the national unemployment estimates for november. a legal battle between two smartphone giants, apple of the united states and samsung of south korea, rages on. the california federal district court has reopened the case over smartphone and other patents. the court has resumed a hearing
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before handing down its final ruling. back in august, a jury ordered samsung to pay more than $1 billion to damages in apple. now samsung is seeking to overturn that verdict. in thur's session the judge urged the two sides to reach a settlement on a global level. she indicated that her court is ready to do everything in its power for that purpose. but apple and samsung remained wide apart in their claims. the california court plans to hand down a separate ruling for each of the many cases the two firms have been fighting, making judgments on the amounts of damages and which types of samsung devices violate apple's patent rights. in the latest case, apple is asking the court to ban sales of 26 types of samsung's smartphones and other devices in the united states and also to increase the amount of the damage payments set in august. starbucks executives will pay 20 million pounds in corporate tax to the british
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government. lawmakers are accusing the u.s. coffee chain of tax avoidance. officials of the chain announce it will pay 10 million pounds, or about $16 million each year in 2013 and 2014. they say they'll do it regardless of whether the company is profitable. starbucks entered the british market in 1998. the chain now has over 700 outlets across the country. but the company posted a profit only once since then, and its official paid no corporate tax for the last three years. starbucks officials said they haven't turned a profit because of high rents and brand royalties paid to their amsterdam-based group firm. tax rates in the netherlands are lower than in britain. they say they will pay more tax in the two years than is required under british law. the asian development bank has raised this year's outlook for five emerging economies. its board members cite strong
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growth in southeast asia, especially in the philippines and malaysia. the bank's board members revised their estimate from 5.6% in october to 5.9%. the five countries are the philippines, malaysia, indonesia, thailand, and vietnam. the bank official said third-quarter expansion in the philippines was high at 7.1%. they said rising consumption and public investment in malaysia is contributing to the region's growth. the story was different for japan. they lowered their 2012 growth estimate by 0.6 percentage points. they cited a drop in exports stemming from a territorial dispute with china. the bank officials say southeast asian economies are supported by solid domestic demand. they added the countries are relatively unaffected by the debt woes in europe. as if to back up the ad bcs's projection, japan's economy remained out of steam in
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october. the latest key economic indicator fell for the seventh straight month. the cabinet office says the coincidence index of the economy ticked down 0.9 points from september to 90.6. the index tracks the current state of the economy and reflects activities like industrial output and employment. government officials trace the decline to the global economic slowdown. they said shipments of tvs and some other products suffered during the month. they downgraded their assessment of the economy to worsening for the first time since march 2009. the operator of the fukushima daiichi nuclear plant has released information about the doses of radiation workers were exposed to at the plant. tokyo electric power company had earlier submitted the same data to the world health organization in march. more than 20,000 people including subcontractors took
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part in emergency operations at fukushima daiichi between march 2011 and the end of january this year. the youngest worker was 18, and the oldest 84. the maximum level of exposure for nuclear plant employees in japan is set at 50 millisieverts per year. that's 50 times more than for the general public. tepco says the highest doses among all personnel reached nearly 680 millisieverts. it was recorded on one of its own employees. workers in their 20s were the most exposed of all age groups with an average dose of nearly 16 millisieverts. those in their 40s were the largest age group with nearly 6,000 personnel, thaw but they received on average a dose of less than 12 millisieverts. exposure to radiation makes it difficult for the operate or the to retain experienced workers. it will remain a major challenge to the decommissioning of the crippled reactor. the operation is expected to take several decades.
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co-winners of this year's nobel prize in physiology or medicine have soaken about their breakthroughs in a news conference. kyoto university professor shinya yamanaka and cambridge university professor emeritus john gurdon are in stockholm to attend the award ceremony on monday. yamanaka says he was able to generate induced pluripotent stem cells or ips cells due to unexpected results from his experiments. >> what i want to say to young scientists is is that when you observe unexpected results, that's -- that's the chance for a new breakthrough or for a new discovery. >> the japanese professor said he wants to speed up his research and that his work will eventually benefit hospitals and patients. >> i am on a scientific stream
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which john gurdon studied 50 years ago. this stream has not been stopped. so we have to draw into clinics or into patients. >> gurdon said he thought when he started had no obvious value from a therapeutic view point, but he said it was completely transformed by professor yamanaka's discovery and he realized that his field could have enormous therapeutic benefits. in the middle east, more than two weeks have passed since a cease-fire took effect in the gaza strip. now israel and hamas are discussing lifting the economic blockade that has choked gaza. hamas has managed to win strong support from ordinary palestinians and in neighboring
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arab countries. this has been achieved in part through its use of the media. nhk world's kohe spds suji reports. >> reporter: israel's bombardment of gaza lasted for eight days and killed over 170 palestinians. a radio station run by hamas remained on air throughout that time and has continued its andy israel broadcasts even since the end of the fight. this is a radio station inside of hamas. in order to tell their side of the story they will do whatever it takes. these children lost close family members in the bombardment. they have been brought in the studio to stoke people's anger and boost support for hamas.
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>> translator: we're just reporting the reality of the situation. we aren't broadcasting propaganda or trying to scare people. >> reporter: hamas cannot match israel's overwhelming interest. to make up for that, islamic movement hit back during the fighting through a war of words. they released a video claiming to have captured an israeli unmanned aircraft. in fact, the aircraft shown is different from an actual israeli drone. the video appears to have been made to give palestinians in gaza the impression that hamas
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is just as strong as the israeli military. hamas has also used social media such as twitter to move from the israeli air strikes killed palestinian children. it also posted photos of children laying on their backs. the intention was to drum up support by showing the outside world what was going on. the strategy had an impact. it triggered anti-israeli protests in many arab countries. foreign ministers from countries in the middle east also visited gaza to express their backing for hamas. this was a major diplomatic achievement for the organization. the israeli military conducted air raids on the buildings that housed its affiliated tv and radio stations. those attacks show that israel was aware that the information war is as important as rocket attacks.
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the israeli forces boast that their capability is far too powerful for hamas. but during the recent fighting, they are forced to take steps to show the international community they were doing everything possible to avoid civilian casualties. the military uploaded nearly 50 videos of its air strikes to show that it was using precision-guided missiles and only targeting hamas facilities. it even released radio communications between pilots. >> reporter: an israeli military spokesperson says social media now are a major battleground. >> social media is like another war zone for us.
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you can reach new audiences, audiences that live only on the internet. for us to get the message out, the pictures out, the footage out without editor's touch, without deciding how big the headline is and what page it will be, we can put all the information out there. >> reporter: true or false, information can be spread around the world using the internet. to control the information is to win the war. this does not change the reality that civilians are always victims of fighting. but use of the media is reshaping the pattern of this long-running conflict. kohei tsuji, nhk world, gaza, in jerusalem. japan's ruling party promised change when it took power in 2009. but it faced challenges. a natural disaster and nuclear accident. an economy dogged by uncertainty. and disputes with neighbors over territory.
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voters now face a choice. who will they trust to guide their country forward? join us december 16th for "japan decides." it's been cold in the area where the earthquake hit earlier on in japan. meteorologist robert speta has more on the weather. robert? well, yes, across much of northern japan. let's take a look at this satellite picture because you can see that cloud cover coming in from the northwest towards the southeast. and what this is is that sea effect snow but also pulling in all this cold air, is so on the west coast you're seeing some heavy snow even over towards the east, but also temperatures in and around this region are diving below the freezing mark here through your overnight hours. miyako expected to get down to minus 2 there. some reports out of miyagi prefecture around minus 3, so very chilly across this area if anybody is out and about going through the next several hours and eventually into your saturday. but meanwhile, we also have this snow threat.
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we have this low pressure here just towards the west of honshu. that is continuing to pull off here towards the east, and you could be seeing upwards of 50 centimeters of snow in many of these areas. now, the good news, you can see that hole over tokyo. well, this is just due to the mountains arnold the area. and actually, if we take a look at this precip model, it goes out and straight around tokyo here, so it does look like you're going to be remaining dry here through the next 24 hours, but the rest of the country is seeing the snow and through the next several days as we see the aftershocks and the threat of avalanche through this area as the snow continues to accumulate. now down towards the south here, we have typhoon bopha continuing to linger here just towards the west of the philippines, still a rather strong typhoon. winds currently with this storm system at 162 kilometers per hour. now, it is expected to linger, start to pull off towards the east, but a lot of that moisture is getting sheared off towards the east as well. take a look at this. all that area in the blue pulling off there, and that's going to bring some heavy
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rainfall and the threat of flooding and even landslides here across the northern portions of luzon. as this storm system continues to move off in that direction. meanwhile, down towards the south, still have the recovery efforts going on across much of this area there in ka teal, while it looks like a storm system -- or this next disturbance continues to pull out here, you're still going to have heavy rain showers pull off across this area, so definitely want to continue to watch out through the weekend. in manila, high of 33, hong kong at 20, and shanghai getting up to 10, but seoul not even reaching the freezing mark here, minus 6 for your high on saturday. all that cold air continuing to pull in from the north, ulan bator at minus 19. speaking of snow, we do have the northwest here, we have a series of low-pressure systems moving across the area. this system here is already bringing some snowfall, and it looks in the next 24 hours you could be seeing upwarlds of about 20 to 30 centimeters of snow. meanwhile, into the cascades,
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you've seen about upwards of 90 centimeters, nearly a meter of snowfall into this area. does look like you're still going to be seeing some more going into your saturday as well. this is going to be accompanied by some dwus gusty winds organization reducing some visibilities here, making things rather messy. we have a frontal area in the great lakes. new england, you could be seeing some snowfall reducing visibilities, but along that frontal area, we have some rainfall, nothing severe, but it will put a damper out and about from friday into saturday. temperatures remain warm here ahead of the front, atlanta with a high of 17. back towards the west, den at 12 degrees and seattle and vancouver at 7. here's a look at your extended forecast. ♪
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recapping our top story here on "newsline," authorities in japan have lifted a tsunami warning and advisories issued for the northeast pacific coast following a strong earthquake. officials with the meteorological agency say the tremor was most likely an aftershock from the march 2011 earthquake.
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the estimated 7.3 magnitude tremor jolted the country at 5:18 p.m. local time triggering tsunami. it struck off the sanriku coast in the tohoku region. this is the same part of japan that was hit by last year's aster. immediately after friday's quake, authorities issued a tsunami warning and advise is for areas along the northeast coast. they say a wave of one meter came racing ashore in the prefecture of miyagi, hitting the port of -- port city of ishinomaki. so far there are no reports of major injuries or damage. authorities lifted their warning and advisories two hours after the quake hit. this tremor struck in early evening as people were heading home from work or getting ready to sit down for dinner. people in tokyo also felt it. buildings in the japanese capital swayed for a couple of minutes. we'll be back with more news in 30 minutes. i'm gene otani in tokyo.
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